Official opioid deaths underestimated by 55% in England and Wales
Thousands of opioid deaths in England and Wales have been missed off official statistics, according to a new analysis.
Researchers at King’s College London scrutinised data from coroners reports between 2011 and 2022 and found 13,000 deaths that had not been recorded in official figures.
They estimated there had been 39,323 deaths from opioids including heroin, methadone, tramadol, dihydrocodeine and fentanyl, over the period looked at.
This is 55% higher than the 25,364 deaths reported by the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
The team said while deaths following opioid use in England and Wales had nearly doubled in the last decade from 22.9 deaths per million people in 2012 to 43.8 deaths per million people in 2023, they had suspected the real number was higher due to the way the data is collected.
ONS data is limited by not having access to post-mortem reports or toxicology results instead relying on information provided by the coroner
To gather more accurate figures, they used data from submitted to the National Programme on Substance Use Mortality (NPSUM) based at the university ‘to triangulate and better estimate’ the true number of deaths.
There is a particular problem around deaths associated with more than one drug which can then be recorded with terms like ‘multidrug overdose’ and not picked up.
The KCL investigation published in the International Journal of Drug Policy also found missing deaths had increased over the years.
The ONS recorded 574 heroin/morphine-related deaths in 2011, but NPSUM data showed there were a likely 239 further unaccounted deaths – an underestimation of 29%.
By 2022 this gap had grown to 34% with the ONS recording 1,264 deaths but the researchers projecting 1,980.
The ONS had long warned that its figures for drug misuse for specific substances are underestimates due to incomplete information.
But in order for drug policy to have impact, the scale of the problem needs to be clear, the researchers concluded.
Study author Dr Caroline Copeland, director of NPSUM said: ‘The UK is grappling with a serious drug-related deaths crisis.
‘All these tragic deaths are preventable, but well-meaning policies, treatment programs and educational campaigns will not have the desired impact unless the true scale of the problem is known – this underestimation will be leading to underfunding.
‘The increase of users taking more than one drug increases the likelihood of accidental overdose and also adds to the reporting problem.
‘We need to alert coroners to the impact that not naming specific drugs as the cause of death has on the planning and funding of public health policies.’
The ONS said the more detail coroners can provide about specific drugs relevant to a death ‘will help further improve these statistics to inform the UK government’s drug strategy’.
A spokesperson for the Department of Health and Social Care said: ‘We continue to work with partners across health, policing and wider public services to drive down drug use, ensure more people receive timely treatment and support, and make our streets and communities safer.’
The Government is currently consulting on changes that would allow physiotherapists to prescribe pregabalin and gabapentin once more to take pressure off GPs.
Visit Pulse Reference for details on 140 symptoms, including easily searchable symptoms and categories, offering you a free platform to check symptoms and receive potential diagnoses during consultations.
